Al Takes On Deadly HBO Role

According to Variety, Al Pacino has just signed on to play the controversial Dr. Jack Kevorkian in a new HBO bio-pic. Kevorkian, aka Dr. Death, was a staunch "right to die" activist who was convicted of second-degree murder for assisting in several suicides.

Barry Levinson (Wag the Dog, Diner) will direct the TV movie, which will focus on the "construction of Kevorkian's infamous "Mercy Machine," his first assisted suicide in the early 1990s and the resulting media frenzy."